7.jpg (Photo : Car News China)
The Guangzhou Automobile Group Co. (GAC) and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles will establish a joint venture to integrate sales and marketing for the Fiat, Chrysler and Jeep brands in China, according to Auto News China.
Fiat Chrysler at present has separate sales and marketing operations in China for the Fiat brand and the Chrysler-Jeep brands.
The move to set up a joint venture that will be dedicated to the integrated sales for the three brands is intended to enhance cooperation between the two companies and pave the way for local Jeep production in China, Auto News China gathered from GAC.
The joint commercial operation will be responsible for all sales, marketing, product planning and after-sales development of Jeep, Fiat and Chrysler brands. This joint operation, it was clarified, will have responsibility for both locally produced and imported products.
GAC Fiat, a 50-50 production joint venture between GAC and Fiat Chrysler, is building a second assembly plant in the south China city of Guangzhou, with actual productions scheduled to start in 2016.
Currently, GAC Fiat Automobile Co. manufactures two Fiat models--namely, the Viaggio compact sedan and the Ottima compact hatchback--at its production facilities in Changsha, a city in central China. Once the new assembly plant is completed, three Jeep models, including one specifically developed for China, will be built in the Guangzhou plant possibly by the end of 2016.
By 2018, GAC Fiat said that the Jeep brand will have one of the most complete SUV portfolios in China ranging from sub-compact SUVs to full-size luxury SUVs.
GAC chairman Zhang Fangyou told China Daily that "GAC will take advantage of this opportunity to collaborate with leading auto brands from Europe and the United States to advance our globalization process, to achieve a more balanced growth, and to provide more options and better services for consumers."
John Kett, General Manager of Fiat Chrysler APAC and Head of the Jeep Brand APAC, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA), added: "Collectively the import brands of Chrysler, Jeep and Dodge, in addition to the localized brands of Fiat, have the group ranked as the fastest growing brands in China. This plan will accelerate our volume and market share growth at significant speed, and will enable us to deliver the commitment that we laid out on this year's FCA investor day by growing our sales volume in China to 760,000 by 2018."
